One morning – perhaps not so far in the future – you wake up and leave the house to get the train to work.
But you can’t. Rail systems have ground to a halt, crippled by a cyber attack that may or may not be linked to the killing of an Iranian dissident in London the week before.
As you wonder what to do, a news alert pings through on your phone: a swarm of ‘suicide’ drones have attacked RAF Akrotiri in Cyprus. One of the UK’s most important military bases is under siege.
It’s an ominous vision, perhaps – and one that now risks coming true as Iran seeks vengeance on the US and its allies for striking its nuclear facilities.
Last night Tehran launched missile attacks against US military bases in Qatar, in a retaliatory operation codenamed ‘Promise of Victory’.
‘Victory’ may be optimistic. Yet, with this attack, let’s be in no doubt that Britain has now grown more vulnerable, too.
Even under the weak, indecisive leadership of Sir Keir Starmer and David Lammy, we are seen as the ‘Little Satan’: one of the great enemies of the Iranian regime.
Before last night’s strikes, Business Secretary Jonathan Reynolds warned that the threat from Iran was already at a ‘significant level’ and it would be ‘naive’ to think the risk will not now escalate. So how could Tehran hurt us?
Like the US, Britain also has a military presence in the Middle East with bases in the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Oman, as well as RAF Akrotiri. These will all be on high alert following last night’s attacks.
And yet, this isn’t the only way the mullahs could strike at the heart of Britain.
Like Russia, Iran practises a creative form of warfare, using what some soldiers and military experts call ‘hybrid’ or ‘asymmetric’ tactics. These are designed to find an enemy’s vulnerabilities using non-traditional tools of violence.
Tehran’s ageing military power is only one element of a much broader set of abilities to reach its enemies. Iran exercises power through its own agents of chaos, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), and via a number of ‘proxy’ terror groups, such as Hamas in Palestine and Hezbollah in Lebanon, which it has trained and funded.
Targets and operations are limited only by Iran’s imagination.
Since being founded in 1979, the IRGC has targeted Iranian dissidents and officials abroad and executed attacks against a number of ‘enemy’ nations.
We already know Iran has been actively hatching plots in Britain. In March, security minister Dan Jarvis told Parliament that UK agencies had prevented more than 20 Tehran-backed plots since 2022, including assassination and abduction attempts. They also prevented an alleged plot to attack Israel’s embassy in London last month, which was foiled by counter-terror police ‘with hours to spare’.
Had this attack gone ahead, it would have sparked an earthquake in the Middle East. Back in 1982, the first bloody Lebanon War was sparked by the attempted assassination of Israel’s ambassador in London.
Now the threat of such tremors is even greater. To defend its ailing regime, Iran may ramp up its threats to those in Britain that it views as ‘enemies’ – including dissident journalists.
Supreme leader Ali Khamenei may view these reporters, broadcasters and online publications in the West as the primary threat to his despotic regime since they can motivate and potentially organise resistance in a way that Israel and the US cannot.
Shamefully, the UK has struggled to protect Iranian dissidents in London because we have failed to keep our streets safe. Some are believed to have moved given the freedom of action that Iran has enjoyed – and which now needs to be stamped out.
That’s before we consider the risk of cyber warfare. Scarcely a week goes by without an attack on critical national infrastructure, as Mr Reynolds revealed this weekend.
This, too, could ramp up if Tehran plots revenge. The NHS, transport networks and government services could all be targeted in a series of coordinated attacks. Albania, which is home to Iranian opposition group Mujahideen-e-Khalq, has already fallen victim to similar assaults with Iranian hackers last week disrupting transport, education and passport services in the capital, Tirana.
Similar attacks would paralyse Britain and risk the security of millions – without spilling a single drop of blood.
And yet, if history teaches us anything, it is that Iranian-backed groups would not shy away from even more violent means.
Tehran and its proxies have masterminded some of the deadliest suicide bombings in recent decades, such as the 1983 truck bombings that killed 241 US troops and 58 French paratroopers in Beirut, which were widely blamed on Hezbollah.
Civilian Jews have also been seen as ‘easy’ targets for this sort of bloodshed, with Hezbollah killing 84 worshippers when it bombed a Jewish community centre in Buenos Aires in 1994.
Might Iran and its proxies try to resurrect these same vile tactics as before – this time on British streets?
Make no mistake, the IRGC and Iranian sleeper cells are already on manoeuvres – including on university campuses where eight IRGC officials addressed students in just three years under the banner of the Islamic Students Association.
Let’s be in no doubt that Iran could also take advantage of the criminal trafficking of so-called asylum seekers, which is already seeing unidentified, radicalised men make their way into Britain. How many of these could end up being sleeper cells for the mullahs’ despotic ambitions?
We can only hope that the evil old men in Tehran will choose to seek moderation, not confrontation, in their final years. Yet, while their power to cause international chaos is waning, it is clearly not over yet.
Dr Bob Seely’s book, The New Total War, is published next month by Biteback.